Mercedes GP Silverstone

Put your Sunday watch on

The Watch Quote™ - November 1st, 2010

It is Sunday. Not any Sunday. The Formula One Grand Prix is about to start. All the cars are on the starting grid.

14:00:00 - The lights go out and on the screen I can see the cars dashing forward. I have a quick look at my watch. Both Mercedes GP Petronas Formula One cars are off.

14:23:17 - First stop in the pits. The car is coming in. The crew are ready. The chief mechanic indicates the pit stop box to the driver. On his right arm, a Graham Mercedes GP watch firmly strapped to his wrist. I push the start button of my Mercedes GP Silverstone. Click. The chronograph instantly reacts. The seconds hand jumps to the first index. 1. 2. 3. It is going to be a race against the clock. I cannot take my eyes off the chronograph hands. The wheel guns unscrew the wheel nuts. Tyres are replaced. Air guns roar again. The car is down. Click. I stop the chronograph. An amazing 3.2 seconds later, the car is moving.

14:42:38 - The safety car comes out. The race is momentarily paused whilst the cars line up behind it. Not the clock. It continues to run. My watch chronograph looks so undaunted. The team wait patiently for the racing to get underway again. I mop the sweat on my forehead with my arm. I can feel the steel case of my watch moving along my skin. In the space of a second, the cool metal calms me down. The Mercedes cars are still in the race.

15:30:08 - Only one lap to go. One of the the the Mercedes cars is going to make the podium. The speed looks good. I need to make sure. I restart my chronograph and stop it after the car has run 1km on the long back straight. The scale of my tachymeter is explicit. It indicates that the car’s speed is at the top. It is going flat out. Tension is still high. We are close to the end.

15:31:58 - Finish line: What a burst of joy when the car crosses the line. The teams’ hands are up in the air, clapping and waving. On their wrist, Mercedes GP watches are agitated. On the podium, the trophy flies up in the air. The watches also sample the joys of victory by having one last test: a bath of champagne. Certified: They are water and now champagne proof.

At every race weekend, the team perform the same modern ballet. More than 28 Graham Mercedes GP watches run in unison with the roaring engines to pick up a few seconds. Everyone speeds up, the watches bang together but no scratches. They have been created to withstand the test of tough environments.

Enter the Graham community

Graham-London traces its origins to London clockmaker George Graham (1673-1751) who is responsible for many innovations in timekeeping. He invented the chronograph, the dead-beat cylinder escapement, the mercury pendulum to compensate for temperature differences. He also built the master clock for Greenwich Royal Observatory which defined time for most of the 18th century. Graham-London was resurrected in 1995 and is today a privately owned Anglo-Swiss watch company which design and builds its own watches in its in La Chaux-de-Fonds production facilities in Switzerland.